


The Haunted House

by Berseker



Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: Character Turned Into a Ghost, F/M, Implied/Referenced Domestic Violence, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-01
Updated: 2020-11-01
Packaged: 2021-03-08 19:01:01
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,854
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27321625
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Berseker/pseuds/Berseker
Summary: Manuel just wants a nice, quiet place to finish writing his book. He gets a ghost instead.
Relationships: Chile/Peru (Hetalia)
Kudos: 3





	The Haunted House

**Author's Note:**

> This was all based on a dream. Not relevant info, I know, but I love when my dreams have plots, so I thought u all should know about it.

Manuel is trying to write his next chapter when she arrives.

He looks up from his keyboard, sees her in his doorstep and freezes in his chair. But the girl - the lady, young woman, whatever - doesn’t move, just stands there and stares at him, her eyes huge and solemn, and maybe slightly alarmed. Her long, wavy hair floats around her as if she were inside the water, and then she clutches her hands in her chest. It’s such a sweet, old-fashioned thing to do, that for a second Manuel thinks she’ll ask for her salts. She wears a dress that was probably in vogue in, oh, 1810, and her skirts covers her feet and drag on the floor, but they move and flow like smoke in the wind.

“What are you doing here?”, she asks, in a soft, commanding voice that trembles a little despite her best efforts.

Manuel stares at her.

And then he says:

“You’re a ghost.”

The lady gasps, appalled at his lack of manners.

In the next second, she’s gone.

Needless to say, Manuel doesn’t write a single line that day.

*

She comes back a few days later, when he’s visiting the winter garden – of course there’s a winter garden – and she looks just the same. A beautiful monochromatic dark-haired women with the flowing hair and frightened eyes.

She looks like she wants to say something, so Manuel waits. He’s not exactly afraid – he’ll freak out if she comes nearer, yes, it's just that, right now, the lady looks more scared of him than he could ever be of her. And anyway it's been three days since her first visitation, and he was waiting. 

Now he wishes he had thought of what to say. His ghost guest looks ready to bolt. 

She doesn't, tho. They stare at each other, and then, after a moment, she whispers:

“You shouldn’t be here. My husband will see you. And then-“

She stops, and bites her lips. 

She has beautiful lips, Manuel thinks, a little dazed.

“I’m sorry,” he says, and stops when she cringes at his voice. Then, softer, he adds, “I’m sure he won’t mind. What’s your name?”

“Oh, yes he will,” she says, “Please, you must leave.”

“I will, just tell me your name. Why are you here? Maybe I can help you-“

She shakes her head, and starts to vanish. Manuel gets up and runs to her, and stops when she _shrieks_. It's not the sound of a tortured soul trying to drag him to hell. It's the high-pitched, startled sound of a girl afraid of being hurt.

He doesn't know what to make of that.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry- just tell me your name!”

To his surprise, she answers. There's almost no trace of her anymore, just a light shimmer in the air, but he hears it in the wind, like a soft whisper. Micaela Prado.

Manuel repeats the name over and over. It sounds right, in his mouth.

*

He leaves a flower for her on top of the piano – of course there’s a piano- and then waits in his own bedroom. 

By now he gave up on his writing. The book wasn't working anyway. 

No wonder renting this stupid place was so easy. This huge, gorgeous colonial palace, and so cheap, too, in a lovely Peruvian historical town. He should have seen this coming, instead of assuming that people were just not traveling much. To here, at least.

He's glad he didn't. Interesting, that. He doesn't remember the last time he was glad about anything. Manuel isn't depressed, not exactly, but...

Well. It has been a difficult year. 

Micaela Prado shows up a little after midnight. He hears a soft melody from downstairs, imagines her ghostly fingers dancing over the piano. Picking up his flower, maybe trying to smell it. Does that even work? Can ghosts smell flowers?

He's thinking about it, when she comes to his door. The flower in her hair, a burst of bright red in an ocean of dark gray strands. She looks at him from the doorstep, and waits for a long time, trying to make up her mind.

And then - he's barely breathing now, afraid of scaring her away - she comes in. And gently sits on the foot of his bed. Crosses her hands on her lap, shy and demure, but Manuel sees the hint of a smile in her pretty lips, and a new sparkle in her eyes. 

He finds himself smiling too. God, it had been a while. Long enough to feel out of practice. 

“Did you like it? It looks nice,” he says. And immediately feels stupid. One of these days he'll have to learn how to flirt. 

Her smile gets wider, and his heart beats faster.

“It’s beautiful,” she answers.

“Just like you,” he says, encouraged. She giggles, soft and musical, and the sound makes Manuel thinks of little bells.

He’s trying to think of what to say when she looks down, and sighs.

“You should go. My husband…”

“Ah, yes. This guy. Is he- uh - very jealous?”

She slides closer to him, and Manuel sits a little straighter. He’s vaguely wishing his pajamas were a little nicer, when she pulls the collar of her dress, and shows him the dark marks of fingers around her neck.

“Look at what he did to me,” she says, mournfully, “Because I smiled at a boy in the street. I just wanted to be courteous. They call me a princess, sometimes. Our people. They say my smile brings good fortune. I was just trying to be nice.”

“What an asshole,” Manuel says, and regrets it right away. She looks puzzled, and then very embarrassed, and he backtracks.

“I’m sorry, I mean… sorry, but he's really a...”

What word did they use in her century? Son of a bitch probably won't go too well either. But then Micaela nods, and rests her hand on her lap again, letting the ghostly fabric hide the scars.

“I knew it would happen. He brought me home right away, and I knew it. I knew he was mad. I shouldn't have come inside. I didn't even scream. I should-”

“No, wait,” he says, “It wasn't your fault, he’s the- uh, the creep, you did nothing wrong!”

But when he goes to touch her arm, she jumps out of his bed, her eyes wide with fear. She stares at him, panting, and then runs from the bedroom. He runs after her, but when he reaches the hall there’s no one there.

*

It takes her a week to come back, and when she does, there are dark circles under her eyes. She looks like she’s been crying.

“I’m sorry,” Manuel says, before Micaela can say anything. He wants to hold her hand, but she’ll run away again if he does. So he stays in his chair, and tries to look as harmless as he can.

She stays at the door for the longest time, and then she enters the library slowly, ready to run if he makes sudden moves.

“I won’t hurt you,” Manuel says, softly.

This makes her pout, her dark eyes filling with a vaguely childish resentment.

“I’m not afraid of you. I just wanted-”

“Tell me. I’ll do it, whatever it is.”

“I shouldn’t. It’s not proper- a lady shouldn’t - my husband-“

He can see the restlessness growing in her beautiful face, so he says, hastily:

“He won’t know, I promise. Tell me, what would you like?”

She bites her lips again. And then – with that soft, almost playful smile that comes more to her eyes than her mouth, she says:

“I’d like to dance again. He won’t let me, he says it’s not proper. He doesn’t want others touching me. And he won’t do it. But I loved to dance, before our marriage. Would you dance with me?”

He’s about to say he doesn’t know how, but she looks so hopeful that he can’t help but smiling. He can’t even remember when – if ever – a girl looked so eager to dance with him.

“You’ll have to teach me,” he says.

Micaela beams at him.

*

Manuel gets an old LP player – of _course_ there’s an LP player, much to Micaela’s fascination, she hovers around and slight above him as he sets it up – and plays a waltz.

She giddily stands in the middle of the room, and he stands in front of her. He puts his hand on her waist, and thinks about how surprisingly solid she is, cold and soft but still very real. She leads him through the steps, and grins when he spins her around. Manuel smiles back, and does it again to see her long hair floating like a veil.

Micaela asks for a minuet after that, and he obliges with pleasure, then another waltz, and then other dances he doesn’t know, names he has read in novels, but never saw in real life, and certainly never tried to dance himself. She’s laughing at him when the song stops, her eyes bright like black pearls, and he doesn't even mind.

Manuel kisses her lips. She freezes for half a second, and he’s afraid he ruined it, that he’ll scare her off again, but then she leans into it.

“I’m not afraid of you,” Micaela says, and giggles, when the kiss ends. She rests her head against his shoulder, and sighs happily. “You won't hurt me. I’m not afraid of you.”

*

She doesn't come back after that.

For the rest of the week, Manuel tells himself that missing a woman who’s been dead for at least a century is too lame even for him.

He still find himself playing that waltz every night.

*

He’s walking around in the city when he gets to the mall – there’s a mall, and he can’t believe he missed it all this time – and bumps into him on his way out.

“Watch were you’re going!” the young man says, but he helps Manuel picks up his wallet and the cellphone and his notebook and pens from the floor anyway. “So,” he says, skimming over the first page – the nerve of this guy, for fuck's sake - “Chilean, uh? Is it nice over there? Which is the cooler country, Chile or Peru?”

“Give me back my stuff,” Manuel snaps, pulling it from his hand, “And I’m done with this question. Everyone asks me that.”

The man grins at him.

“And you’re tired of admitting we’re cooler?”

Manuel doesn’t bother rolling his eyes. He’s about to leave when the man offers his hand:

“Miguel Prado,” he says, “What’s your name?”

Manuel stares.

The dark hair and the bright black eyes and the playful smile, and the perfect kissable lips.

“Tell you what,” he says slowly, after an awkwardly long time, as he shakes his hand harder than he’s supposed to, “Let's lunch, my treat. And then I'll tell you how and why Chile is obviously superior.”

The man laughs. It's bright and loose and challenging, nothing like her soft musical laughter. For some reason, it still makes Manuel think of chiming bells.

And it still makes him smile in return.


End file.
